Alfred Eisenstaedt was the man behind some of the most memorable pictures of the 20th century. He got his start in Weimar Germany in the 1920s. Having fled Nazi Germany in the 1930s, he shot the debut of LIFE magazine in 1936 until the publication ended. The very same year he emigrated to the US he became one of the first four photographers hired by LIFE. Pretty impressive. Even when LIFE was over, Eisenstaedt continued shooting hundreds of images through the 1990s.

Eisenstaedt’s work reminds us that our tools only function when we understand the world and can translate our creative vision. All of Eisenstaedts images share the deeply humane sensibility that defined the very best work of the man’s creative eye. Who he shot, and how, is entrenched in his legacy as a photographer.